During the development of the original Star Fox, character designer Takaya Imamura originally wanted to make the characters generic humans and aliens, similar to his character designs from F-Zero. It was Shigeru Miyamoto who convinced him to instead make them anthropomorphic animals, as he wanted the game's aesthetic to stand out from every other science fiction property coming out at the time.

Fox in particular being a fox was inspired by the Fushimi Inari-taisha shrine located near Nintendo's offices.

According to character designer Takaya Imamura, each of the original Star Fox team members were modeled after his fellow Nintendo staff members at the time:

• Fox was based on Shigeru Miyamoto, with Miyamoto said to have a fox-like face.
• Falco was based on Tsuyoshi Watanabe, as the development team laughed over how his nose stuck out like a beak.
• Peppy was based on Katsuya Eguchi, with Eguchi said to have a mouth like a hare.
• Slippy was based on Yoichi Yamada, with Yamada said to have large, round eyes.

Imamura has also stated that he based Andross on his "boss at the time". It remains unknown who at Nintendo he is specifically talking about, though it's been long rumored that Andross was intended as a caricature of then-Nintendo president Hiroshi Yamauchi, who was known for his cutthroat and ruthless ways. However, it's also been speculated that Imamura is referring to Hiroshi Ikeda, the then-manager of Nintendo R&D4 (later EAD) who was also Miyamoto's boss, though it's worth pointing out that Ikeda had stepped down from his position in 1992.

Argonaut Software's Starglider games released in the 1980s, which were first-person combat flight simulators rendered with wireframe vector graphics, inspired them to come up with a prototype that would eventually lead to the creation of the first Star Fox. They created a prototype for the Nintendo Entertainment System codenamed as "NESGlider" that was based on the original game, utilizing a similar method to accelerate graphics to how the Super FX chip for the Super Nintendo Entertainment System later would. When they showed this prototype to Nintendo in 1990, they were instead advised to port and develop the game for the then-upcoming SNES. After Argonauts did that, Nintendo declared that this was the best 3D graphics the console could produce and that they hadn't designed the SNES with 3D games in mind. Argonaut staff suggested that if they wanted better, then they should let them design a 3D chip for them, and thus the Super FX chip was born.

The go-to term for the initial conflict of the Star Fox series, as told in three different installments (Star Fox on SNES, Star Fox 64, and Star Fox Zero), is the "Lylat Wars". This name originates from the original PAL release of Star Fox 64, where it was renamed to Lylat Wars due to trademark issues (similarly to why the first Star Fox was renamed to "Starwing" there as well). In comparison, its 3DS remake, Star Fox 64 3D, would retain the Star Fox 64 moniker in all regions. Nintendo would later actually canonize the "Lylat Wars" moniker as the official name of the conflict against Andross' forces in the opening prologue to Star Fox Zero.

The hand-operated puppets utilized in Japanese promotional material for the first Star Fox game, as well as the cover of one of its guidebooks, were created by Takashi Yamazaki, a Japanese filmmaker and visual effects supervisor best known internationally for his 2023 film "Godzilla Minus One".

While artist Takaya Imamura would be responsible for the character designs of the Star Fox team, all but one member of the team would be named by Star Fox's programmer, Dylan Cuthbert:

• Fox's surname, McCloud, was inspired by Connor MacLeod from the 1986 film Highlander, as Cuthbert wanted to give him a "cool sounding name" and wanted it to be based on his piloting abilities.
• Peppy's name was based on his characteristic of having a lot of energy despite his old age.
• Slippy's name was based on his clumsy, slippery characteristics.

According to Imamura, Falco Lombardi's name was inspired by Carlo Rambaldi, a famed Italian special effects and make-up artist who worked on films such as Alien and E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial.